COLOMBIAN INDIANS CREATE SODA FROM COCA

BOGOTA, Columbia -- A new soft drink made in Colombia may not be
cola, but it's definitely coca. A Nasa Indian company in southern
Colombia has created a golden, carbonated drink made from coca leaf
extract, and they plan to market it as an alternative to Coca-Cola.

Coca Sek goes on sale this week in parts of Colombia, but its makers
say they probably won't be able to export to the U.S. or most other
countries because of rules blocking the entry of raw coca, the plant
from which cocaine is refined.

"Six years ago we took on the job of trying to re-establish the good
name of the coca leaf, which is a plant with enormous medicinal
properties," said David Curtidor, a Nasa who heads the community
company that produces the drink in the tiny southwestern town of Calderas.

The soda looks like apple cider, has a tea-like fragrance and tastes
vaguely like a cross between 7-Up and ginger ale. The physical effect
of drinking it - even after several bottles - is minimal.

"It's an energizing drink," Curtidor said. "It's like coffee since it
is lightly stimulating."

Curtidor says the drink also is a political statement against
transnational companies such as the Coca-Cola Co., which "symbolizes
imperialist domination."

Coca-Cola spokeswoman Kirsten Watt, in Atlanta, said such competitors
are welcome. "They're entitled to create beverages as they see fit," she said.

As for its own ingredients, Coca-Cola is tight-lipped. "Cocaine has
never been an ingredient," Watt said, though she declined to say
whether cocaine-free coca extract is part of the drink's secret
recipe, as has been widely reported. "We just can't talk about the
ingredients, the specific flavor composition."

Coca Sek's makers say raw coca leaf extract is a key ingredient in their soda.

The company, which has 12 to 15 employees at a small bottling plant,
does not have the funds needed to carry out tests to pinpoint how
much naturally occurring cocaine alkaloid makes its way into the
drink, Curtidor said. But the company has done tests showing all
alkaloids - which include cocaine and other substances - make up less
than half of 1 percent of the drink.

"The traces that can remain are minimal because the formula we have
is one with a very low level of cocaine," he said.

A group of Nasa Indians started selling coca tea, which is common in
the Andes, to Colombian supermarkets several years ago. A year and a
half ago, they began experimenting by adding ingredients and cooling
the drink, Curtidor said. They decided to call it Coca Sek, which in
their Indian language means "Coca of the Sun."

Their company, Empresa Colombiana de la Coca, aims to benefit small
coca farmers, Curtidor said.

Similar drinks have appeared in Peru using a formula based on coca
leaves. But such products are banned in most nations outside the Andean region.

Curtidor said his group has sold small amounts of coca tea in Canada,
France and the United States. But he said it would probably be
impossible to export the soda on a larger scale because of import restrictions.

For now, Coca Sek remains a very local product.

"One of the first goals we have is to obtain a distribution truck,"
Curtidor said. In the meantime, the company rents space on other
companies' trucks.

The clear, small bottles with blue plastic caps went on display at a
crafts fair in Bogota this month. The drink is scheduled to hit
supermarkets starting Friday in the southern Colombian states of
Cauca and Valle, and Curtidor said he hopes to eventually roll it out
nationwide.

Colombia is the world's No. 1 producer of cocaine, and the United
States is the top buyer. But the coca leaf has many other uses. For
centuries, Indians in the region have chewed the plant's leaves to
ward off hunger and fatigue. Some Nasa Indians are now trying out the
leaf in wines, cookies and even soaps.

The soft drink's makers say it already has been sampled by many
Colombians and has won wide approval.

"We have a very big market," Curtidor said. "People are going to
prefer it out of solidarity and for the delicious flavor it has."